Chapter 15

"Oh, I may have remembered a story about Tal poisoning!" Tarkas exclaimed loudly.

I was laying in my bedroll, recovering from the light workout he had just put me through. As a consequence of my symptoms, my training was getting lighter and lighter each day.

I was prepared to tell him to keep it down, loud noises made my migraines flare up, but the topic made me catch my breath.

The number of actual ideas with substance behind them was few and far between, I had to hear him out.

"It was from my days when I was training with my father, I think I asked him something like, 'if Tal really is powerful and natural, why do we need to filter it out of our body?'"

I watched Tarkas try and recall the events.

"If I remember correctly, he told me about my great uncle Irt who had trained to be a monk. Irt found a scripture describing the 'Pure Tal Body,' something that could be achieved by injecting Tal directly into the bloodstream."

"It was theorized that with a body and mind strong enough to survive the toll it would take on the body, one's body could adapt to the accumulation of Tal and harness it for themselves."

I was astonished, not only by the concept of it but by the fact that he hadn't remembered it earlier. Hope sparked within me, maybe this would be my golden opportunity.

I had to ask, "Well, was senior Irt able to achieve it?"

Tarkas' face darkened, "My great uncle died at the young age of 24, only 2 weeks after beginning the regular Tal injections."

The spark died.

"The reason I hadn't brought this up already... Irt was hailed as one of the great fools of my family. I just thought that at this point, anything could help." He grimaced.

I'm sure he was feeling a bit guilty, I wasn't the best at hiding my excitement when it comes to this topic.

"No, no. It's alright. Thanks, Tarkas." I smiled at him, "Maybe if I can make it through this, I'll be able to restore ol' Irt's good name."

At that, he returned the smile, "Yeah, Hale. Maybe so."

"Erm- sorry to interrupt. Hale, it's about that time." Fie had been standing right outside of our conversation, waiting for the right time to interject.

It was time for my daily failure- I mean, magic lessons.

The idea of magic was still exciting to me, but each lesson without even a morsel of progress hammered hopelessness into my heart.

As we arrived at her cot, I spoke up, "Hey, Fie, is this really necessary? I mean, at this point, it's pretty obvious that this is not possible for me."

The small girl ignored me and started digging into her bag, leaving me with just a view of her short-cropped straight white hair.

"Seriously, I appreciate you doing this but-"

She spun on her heel and looked at me with a grin.

"I had an idea."

Fie revealed a small trinket in her hand. it looked to be a gold pendant removed from the necklace. In the very center, there was a small crystal emitting a faint yellow color.

She gestured to the crystal, "do you know what this is?"

I looked closely at it. From just my observations, it didn't look much different from any other yellow crystal.

"Uhh, topaz?" I just answered with the only yellowish gem I could think of.

She raised an eyebrow as if she didn't recognize the name. I almost wanted to facepalm.

It seemed like whatever language magic was helping me out would be able to find an apt translation for most words, but the more specific the name, the less likely there would be a suitable word.

Topaz, it seemed was one of those cases.

This wasn't the first time I had slipped in front of Fie. She's smart, I thought she had already caught onto the inconsistencies in my "amnesia" background, but I wasn't sure of how much she knew.

"Incorrect, this is a Kasal crystal."

I stared back at her blankly.

"You remember me telling you that all things in the world are able to hold Tal to some extent?"

I nodded.

"Well, crystals and gemstones are special, they have a much higher mass to Tal ratio than almost everything. It's dependent on the type and rarity of the crystal, of course, but these gems can often be used to supplement mages with small tallos."

My eyes widened.

"This here Kasal crystal is one of the most common types of crystals, only barely able to hold yellow Tal, but it's enough to use a couple of simple spells."

Excitement, real excitement surged through me. It was obvious that this wasn't any sort of solution, but it was something. More than anything, I was going to be able to try using magic.

Only one thing caught me, "What do you mean, yellow Tal? Isn't Tal just Tal?"

She looked surprised, "Oh, I can't believe I forgot to explain that. Here."

She pulled out the tool that she used to test my Tallo prior.

"The color of Tal can be influenced by many things, but it is generally determined by the concentration of Tal. White signified extremely small amounts, while the most concentrated Tal I've heard of is purple Tal. Though that is at a level far beyond me."

She continued on, "The scale starts at a white and gets darker as concentration increases. As far as I know, the scale goes like this: White, Yellow, Orange, Red, Pink, and Purple. It would theoretically continue past that into Blue and Black Tal, but because the amount of Tal increases exponentially with each color, that's likely impossible."

It made sense, it was similar to power levels in the old manga I had read. She tried to explain the math behind it, but it was a bit much for me. The gist that I understood was that one level was generally about 10 times more concentrated than the last.

That meant that something like Pink Tal would be 1000 times more powerful than Yellow Tal.

For a moment, curiosity got the better of me.

"So what is your Tal concentration at?" I asked.

I instantly realized the possible intrusiveness of what I had said.

I backtracked, "I mean, only if you want to tell me of course. I don't know if that's something that people keep quiet or not..."

I trailed off, Fie was giggling at my indecisiveness.

"My tallo can hold up to Orange Tal." She smiled at me, "It is generally considered private information, but we're party members aren't we?"

She gestured towards my sternum, "Plus, I already know how much you can store anyways. So we're even."

I frowned at her, "Uncool, Fie."

The elf giggled more, "Hehe, sorry, sorry."

I looked towards the pendant and picked it up, feeling the cool smoothness of the gemstone on my palm.

"So how do I use this thing?"

-

The concept was simple, I had already been internalizing the process for days on end.

In the past, I was told to visualize my tallo core. From there, I was meant to draw the Tal out of it, leading it through my Tal channels and into my palms. For simple spells, just repeating the simple incantations would supply the Tal with enough intent to cast.

It seemed simple, but it was incredibly abstract. My lack of a tallo made all of these explanations frustrating and intangible. It was one of the reasons that I had been frustrated to the point of wanting to quit.

Fundamentally, this was the same, I was just replacing my tallo with this gem's Tal.

I concentrated on the yellowish gem lying flat on my palm. I stared into the cuts and karats of the gem, trying my hardest to understand what I was supposed to be feeling.

Fie was watching my lack of progress, "Hmm, if you can't feel anything, try closing your eyes. Try to feel the weight of the gem in your palm in the same way you can feel the latent Tal pressing down on your body."

Silently, I obeyed. I took a deep breath as I closed my eyes, directing my focus on the feeling of the Tal.

The higher in the dungeon we climbed, the more tangible the Tal around me felt. The dungeon's Tal was an ocean, the intermittent current pulled me every which way, and waves crashed down on me from above, pulling me down deeper.

When I focused too hard on this feeling, I could feel myself struggling to breathe, my body panicking as if I was actually caught in a phantom undertow.

I hated this feeling. I abhorred it. All I wanted was to open my eyes and distract myself from that constant pressure. I fought the current.

My breathing became labored and erratic as my body pushed against the latent Tal. A bead of sweat ran down my brow.

A cold hand touched my upturned wrist.

"That's not a fight you can win, Hale. Breathe. Remember what you're looking for."

I exhaled. The current swept me away, and I was back at the whim of the Tal.

Frustrated and tired, I went to open my eyes-

A pool of calm Tal. Why couldn't I see that before? Right within my reach lay a yellow lagoon. I reached toward the pool.

Control, the moment my fingertip touched the surface, the Tal began to swirl toward me. I recoiled out of surprise and the Tal did the same, shirking away.

Incredible.

"Don't be afraid of it, let yourself control it, Hale." I could faintly hear Fie's words.

I slowly re-extended my hand towards the surface.

The moment my finger again touched the Tal, it had the same reaction and swirled towards me.

My instincts screamed at me to release it, maybe it was a reaction built from the Tal currently poisoning my system, but I grit my teeth as I resisted it.

The Tal floated into me and instantly spread throughout my body. It was different than the Tal outside, this felt... Right.

These must be my Tal channels.

They felt small and weak, like a muscle that had never been trained, but they were most definitely there.

Unconsciously, the Tal began pooling in my palm, as if it knew my intents better than myself.

I took a deep breath and opened my eyes. I looked towards my palm and couldn't see anything other than the faintest hint of a white mist. I didn't have to see the Tal to know it was there, I could feel it pooling in my palm.

Fie's face lit up. "Now Hale, it's time to put all that work memorizing to use."

I smiled and began reciting. It was short and sweet. An easy incantation for the simplest spell.

And on the 4th night of our expedition, I cast magic for the very first time.